28 BULLETIN 878, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
The dealer may lose money on account of shrinkage when he buys’ 
a certain undoubted amount of excess water in the hay at the price 
of market hay. Therefore he is wholly justified in assuming that 
when this loss is caused by shrinkage it is a positive money loss. In 
order to make up for such loss he advances the selling price when it is, 
within his power to do so. 
WHAT IS HAY? 
The misunderstandings regarding shrinkage, especially those 
bearing upon economic phases, would never be so widespread as they — 
are to-day if there were a clear and definite understanding as to just 
what is hay, and if there were standard terms used to designate the 
kind or condition of hay at any stage of curing. 
It may seem, at first thought, that it is a comparatively easy mat- 
- ter to describe or define hay so that all of those engaged in the pro- 
duction or utilization of this crop may have a common, definite under- 
standing concerning it, a product with which almost everyone is more 
or less familiar. It is only when one undertakes to define the term 
that he begins to appreciate the difficulties that make practically 
impossible the framing of a single definition that will embrace all of 
the different kinds of hay and that will be acceptable to all classes of 
people engaged in the.hay industry. 
These difficulties have nothing to do with the question of grades 
or quality of hay as they are known on the market, because the 
question of grade concerns only a definite and well-understood kind © 
of hay. The unqualified term ‘‘hay,’ however, may mean any one 
of a great number of things, from grass that has been just cut to hay 
that contains less than the normal water content. In view of this _ 
fact it becomes apparent that to be able to define precisely it will © 
be necessary to have not merely one, but several definitions, each of 
which should describe accurately a particular kind of hay. 
INDISCRIMINATE USE OF TERMS. 
No one class of men concerned with the hay industry may be said 
to be responsible for the present conflicting ideas as to just what 
constitutes hay. Hay, in the farm management or labor sense, may 
be something quite different from hay as viewed from the standpoint 
of the city commission man or the consumer. For example, it is 
quite common, indeed almost universal, for the farmer to speak of 
‘““mowing hay,” ‘‘tedding hay,” or “‘cocking hay,’ when as a mat- 
ter of fact the material thus spoken of is not in reality hay at all. 
Strictly speaking, we mow grass, and use the tedder on fresh or 
partly cured forage that is being made into hay. 7 
The many terms commonly used to describe hay that is ready to : 
be put into the stack, barn, or bale are given in Table III. 
